Page 1 of 1

Good cheap usb soundcards to buy?

Posted: Thu Mar 03, 2011 9:13 pm
by Dystinkt
My desktops a run down piece of shit reconditioned computer bought on the cheap, would anybody have any usb soundcards they could recommend for me on the cheap?

Re: Good cheap usb soundcards to buy?

Posted: Thu Mar 03, 2011 10:20 pm
by MB616
I'm running the Native Instruments Audio Kontrol 1 and I like it a lot. Great for live use as well.

Re: Good cheap usb soundcards to buy?

Posted: Thu Mar 03, 2011 10:25 pm
by upstateface
Focusrite saffire 6 ;-)

Re: Good cheap usb soundcards to buy?

Posted: Fri Mar 04, 2011 12:10 am
by lyons238
upstateface wrote:Focusrite saffire 6 ;-)
+1 for the saffire 6. its one of the best usb interfaces in it's class. i got mine for 160 shipped on ebay and it comes with ableton lite and some plugins and stuff. its great for producing and djing. i couldnt be happier. no latency issues and sounds great.

my other choices were the NI Kontrol 1, but i read a lot of people were having issues with it, and that its going to be discontinued so i stayed away. my other choice was a EMU0404 but its a bit more expensive and didn't have all of the connections/features i wanted.

Re: Good cheap usb soundcards to buy?

Posted: Fri Mar 04, 2011 5:55 am
by Ldizzy
thoughts on the apogee one?

Re: Good cheap usb soundcards to buy?

Posted: Fri Mar 04, 2011 8:53 am
by vertx
upstateface wrote:Focusrite saffire 6 ;-)

Re: Good cheap usb soundcards to buy?

Posted: Fri Mar 04, 2011 11:23 am
by casual-p
vertx wrote:
upstateface wrote:Focusrite saffire 6 ;-)
I read somewhere this is a USB 1.1 device? Otherwise the pre's and converters on focusrite are really good for the price

Re: Good cheap usb soundcards to buy?

Posted: Fri Mar 04, 2011 12:04 pm
by vertx
casual-p wrote:
vertx wrote:
upstateface wrote:Focusrite saffire 6 ;-)
I read somewhere this is a USB 1.1 device? Otherwise the pre's and converters on focusrite are really good for the price
I was hesitant about that at first but i talked to a few people on here and it isn't a problem, something about the data rate of the audio you are putting through it will never exceed usb 1.1 speeds - mainly an issue in recording but as the saffire is only able to record 2 inputs at once focusrite went with the usb 1.1 so they could keep the prices of the unit down.

Re: Good cheap usb soundcards to buy?

Posted: Fri Mar 04, 2011 12:05 pm
by lyons238
casual-p wrote:
vertx wrote:
upstateface wrote:Focusrite saffire 6 ;-)
I read somewhere this is a USB 1.1 device? Otherwise the pre's and converters on focusrite are really good for the price
yeah this doesn't matter it has 2 ins/ 4 outs. usb 1.1 is more than enough to transfer all of those channels at once, otherwise they wouldn't have built it that way. everyone always gets hung up that its usb 1.1, but in reality usb 2.0 would be useless on the device besides making it sound better. there are no latency issues AT ALL, its actually lower than most 2.0 devices.

edit: haha this guy ^ just beat me to it. but yeah the usb 1.1 works great for the interface and is light on the ole' cpu.

Re: Good cheap usb soundcards to buy?

Posted: Fri Mar 04, 2011 12:08 pm
by casual-p
yeh just latency i was curious about. heard nothing but good things about it. someone managed to get a saffire LE for 60 pounds this week though lol

Re: Good cheap usb soundcards to buy?

Posted: Fri Mar 04, 2011 7:15 pm
by lyons238
casual-p wrote:yeh just latency i was curious about. heard nothing but good things about it. someone managed to get a saffire LE for 60 pounds this week though lol
yeah like i said no latency issues at all. the latency is actually better than most 2.0 devices.

Re: Good cheap usb soundcards to buy?

Posted: Fri Mar 04, 2011 9:24 pm
by therook
+1for the saffire 6. I can plug my guitar right into it and the latency is reeeaalll good. I also like the headphone jack and all the volume control knobs :)

I think I paid $200 for it at sam ash. The ableton version it comes with is garbage. You can't do shit with it because it is so limited. The vst's are also.. kinda bad (novation bass station and some other efx vsts)

Re: Good cheap usb soundcards to buy?

Posted: Fri Mar 04, 2011 9:54 pm
by lyons238
therook wrote:+1for the saffire 6. I can plug my guitar right into it and the latency is reeeaalll good. I also like the headphone jack and all the volume control knobs :)

I think I paid $200 for it at sam ash. The ableton version it comes with is garbage. You can't do shit with it because it is so limited. The vst's are also.. kinda bad (novation bass station and some other efx vsts)
the ableton version is not shitty its just the lite version. you cant expect more than that. and yes the headphone jack is great, i also like the button it has below it, you push that when you want to preview and cue up tracks when djing, so the music in your headphones is not the same as your main output.

Re: Good cheap usb soundcards to buy?

Posted: Thu Mar 17, 2011 9:21 pm
by Dystinkt
Thanks for the answers everybody but im talkin real cheap here, only got about 60-80 pounds to spend here, and the specs of my computer are poor.

Re: Good cheap usb soundcards to buy?

Posted: Thu Mar 17, 2011 9:27 pm
by hifi
Apogee Duet. got one, sounds good